Saturday, November 9, 2013

If
Cricket is gentlemen’s game ~ what is the name of the game that the great
gentleman Viswanathan Anand play ?!?!?

Going by the
pre-match hype, the Vishy Vs Magnus match is getting a boxing bout or the olden
day wrestling bout hype of Kingkong Dharasingh.
Termed as ‘Experience of Vishy Vs Youth of Carlsen’………. Would analysts
make us understand that whether any of these aspects singularly guarantee a win
or are they making it easier for themselves to brace ‘I told you so’
later.

Chennai
is witnessing this rare spectacle – more so with the State Government
sponsoring and CM Ms Jayalalithaa glittering the opening ceremony and picking
up the draw. The city is decked with
Chess connotations ~ in Marina a giant chess board sprung up and more. The way we are reading reports makes us think
that these players are computer brains sitting before giant screens with bigger
team of wizards honing their skills in shadow boxing, just as Sachin Tendulkar
was shown preparing in the nets without a bat – no bowler and nothing being
bowled at.

Not many of us
understand the nuances or the time period that it would take for a game – and I
truly wonder whether this is a spectator sport………. the physical aspect of chess is often
underestimated – players shown as sitting in one place, hands on chin, concentrating
on one thing for several hours and not getting the boredom at all.

Is there any home
advantage in such a game and is Hyatt Regency giving a great ambience to the
viewers too….. In a First post report is
stated that Carlsen was once asked which
animal he would like to be, his answer was crocodile. “It seems to have a good
life. A crocodile just lies there and relaxes, and it can more or less kill any
other animal. Crocodile without a doubt,” he said. Anand had said in the interview
to the Financial Times. “A match is really a contest of space between two
people, and you can’t give the other one any quarter.” The match has already
begun ……….

At 3pm Indian
time, the two players started their first game of the match, Carlsen having the
white pieces. The FIDE World Chess Championship, fully sponsored by the state
of Tamil Nadu, will be played over 12 games and is taking place from 7th to
28th November at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Chennai, India.

The hot
news is that defending champion Viswanathan Anand, playing with Black pieces,
drew with Magnus Carlsen in the opening match of the world chess championship
in Chennai on Saturday. Game 1 went on for one hour and twenty-two minutes and
both competitors played 16 moves each before a draw was declared.
Every game is worth a solitary point – the winner takes it all and in case of a
draw both get half. There would be 12
matches over 20 days and the first one to get 6.5 points wins…. Anand and
Carlsen are playing for a USD 2.55 million purse.

To us, the 43-year-old Super Grand Master, the undisputed
world champion is the favourite at heart.
Today, after photographic repetition, both players shake hands as the
game ended in a short draw. So nothing much happening in the opening encounter
of the most high profile clash in the history of Chess.